CroxyProxy is the default answer for a reason. It handles video, it handles modern sites, and it usually just works.

Right up until it doesn't.

Maybe your network blocked the domain. Maybe it's crawling because half the internet is on it tonight. Maybe your session expired thirty seconds into something.

Whatever the reason, you want a backup. Here's what's on my list, and honestly why.

Why CroxyProxy Gets Blocked First

Quick bit of logic that explains a lot.

Network filters work from lists. Somebody has to add a domain before it gets blocked.

The most popular proxy in the world is on every one of those lists. Being the best known is exactly what makes it the first casualty.

Which means the fix is often nothing clever. Just something less famous.

Proxyium

My first try when Croxy is down.

Clean interface, quick to load, no account, no nonsense. It's newer, so it's on fewer blocklists.

Good for: general browsing, unblocking a page fast.
Weaker at: video, which is hit and miss.

We went into more detail in our Proxyium review.

Blockaway

Built on the same sort of modern engine as CroxyProxy, so it copes with real websites rather than plain HTML.

Its actual advantage is being less known, which on a school or office network is worth more than any feature.

Good for: filtered networks, sites that need JavaScript.
Weaker at: ads, and it's newer so there's less track record.

ProxySite

The old reliable. Been around forever, runs a pile of servers across the US and Europe, and puts shortcuts to commonly blocked sites right on the homepage.

Good for: one page, right now, no thinking.
Weaker at: anything heavy. It's a simpler tool from a simpler era.

KProxy

This one has a trick the others don't: browser extensions.

An extension survives what a website can't, because once it's installed there's no proxy domain left for a filter to catch.

Good for: stubborn filters, if you're allowed to install extensions.
Weaker at: free data limits, and the interface is showing its age.

Hide.me

Slightly different animal. Free web proxy, but also a company with a real name, a published no-logs policy, and a free VPN tier if you outgrow the proxy.

Good for: when you want to know who you're trusting.
Weaker at: free locations, there aren't many.

How to Spot a Bad One

There are hundreds of proxy sites and a decent number of them are not worth your traffic. A few signals I use before typing anything into one:

  • It wants you to install something. A web proxy is a web page. If it's pushing an installer, close the tab.
  • Pop-ups that fight back. One ad is the business model. Five that reopen themselves is a warning.
  • It asks for personal details. To load a website? No.
  • No HTTPS on the proxy itself. If the padlock isn't there, everything you type goes across in the open.

I once used one that worked beautifully for about a week, then started injecting its own ads into the pages it served me. Not its own page. The pages I was viewing.

That's the quiet risk with a web proxy. It isn't just showing you the site, it's rewriting it on the way through, and you're trusting it not to be creative about that.

A Note on Speed

One thing worth setting expectations on: every free web proxy is slower than your normal connection, and it has nothing to do with which one you picked.

Your request now takes a detour. It goes to the proxy, the proxy goes to the site, then the whole thing comes back the same way. That's twice the distance at minimum.

Add a few thousand other people sharing that same server tonight and you have your answer for why video buffers.

So when one feels slow, don't assume it's broken. Try a different server location, ideally one closer to you or closer to the site. Distance matters more than most people expect.

The Option Nobody Mentions

Here's my honest opinion after years of this.

Web proxies are a workaround. You're browsing inside somebody else's page, with their ads, their session limits, their timeouts, and their idea of how long you deserve to stay connected.

The alternative is to skip the wrapper entirely.

Take an IP and port from our free proxy list, put it in your browser settings once, and browse normally. No proxy page. No countdown. No “session expired” banner.

It takes two minutes the first time, and it's covered step by step in how to set up a proxy.

You also get to pick the country, which most web proxies won't let you do properly. Need a US address? US proxies are filtered and ready.

What I'd Actually Do

Croxy is blocked and I need one page right now: Proxyium or ProxySite. Ten seconds.

School or office filter eating everything: Blockaway, or KProxy's extension if I can install it.

Anything I'm doing repeatedly: a proxy IP in the browser, checked first with our proxy checker. Set it up once, stop fighting.

Bookmark two of these. The whole problem with relying on one proxy site is that you find out it's down at exactly the moment you needed it.